FEATURE:
Second Spin
MARINA – Love + Fear
___________
OVER the past few weeks…
I have been listening to a lot more Pop that I wouldn’t normally investigate. I have always known about Marina Diamandis and her Marina and the Diamonds, and her albums are really strong; they can cross borders and age barriers and resonate with everyone. I don’t think one should label and pigeonhole artists and albums and, with Marina and the Diamonds, it is just great music that anybody can bond with. Love + Fear (2019) was the first album under the mononym, MARINA, and that does not signal a radical departure in terms of the previous three studio albums. On her fourth outing, I think there is more ambition, ‘herself’ and variation than any album previously. Love + Fear is a double album that is divided into two eight-track sides. It is an interesting concept and, whilst other artists have done similar, I think Diamandis really adds something new and unique to the mix. According to the songwriter, all human emotions stem from love and fear; there are tributaries and similar emotions, but there is that starting place of love and fear – from love comes happiness and peace, whereas fear leads to guilt and hate. It is an interesting approach, and I think that idea could be widened to a visual project or short film. I am not sure whether there are plans to adapt the album, but I think there is more life in it. That is one reason why I think critics overlooked it somewhat!
I admit that there are more strong songs on the album’s first half – with Handmade Heaven, and Orange Trees -, but there is great consistency and very few weak moments. At sixteen tracks and running at under an hour, I don’t think Love + Fear outstays its welcome; there are great non-singles like To Be Human, and Too Afraid that warrant new interrogation. Diamandis manages to keep the listener invested and interested from the start to finish! The album did get a few massive reviews, but many were sort of three-star assessments that offered positives and some constructive criticism. In their review, this is what Pitchfork observed:
“Elsewhere, though, Marina finds herself unable—or maybe afraid—to offer any originality. “True” is little more than a string of bland body-positivity slogans, too stale for a Dove commercial a decade ago. “Superstar” hints at substance by pairing foreboding minor-key synths with the opening lyric, “Before I met you, I pushed them all away,” then devolves into a standard, sugary love song. On “To Be Human,” Marina stretches the bridge of U2’s “Beautiful Day” to the length of a full song, and fills the space with a bizarre reference to Vladimir Lenin’s embalmed corpse. Though Marina has called “To Be Human” the album’s “most political song,” she resists making any definitive statements.
When she sings, “There were riots in America/Just when things were getting better,” she doesn’t deign to place the lyric in context. Which riots? What was getting better, and for whom? By contrast, “Savages,” a standout from 2015’s Froot, offered a blazing indictment of human aggression that simultaneously demonstrated Marina’s strength as a songwriter: “I’m not afraid of God/I am afraid of man”.
I do think that Love + Fear has so many depths and standout moments and, whilst I had not dug into too many Marina and the Diamonds albums prior to last year’s Love + Fear, after hearing tracks on that album I then went back and compared the albums. In a more positive and accurate review, AllMusic went into depth:
“Shedding the "and the Diamonds" appendage of her stage name, Welsh pop maven Marina emerged from a self-imposed four-year absence to unveil a revitalized approach on her fourth album, Love + Fear. Stepping into the spotlight without the protection of her former moniker, she reveals a renewed confidence and tempered optimism, shedding some of the quirkiness and cheek of her early efforts, while moving past 2015's lackluster Froot. Following the difficult promotion of that album, Marina was worn out and considered quitting music. She retreated to recalculate life, studying developmental psychology -- a process she describes in "Handmade Heaven" -- and shedding the Diamonds to be herself. Alongside producers Joel Little, OzGo, Sam de Jong, and others, she crafted a double-album concept presented as complementary sides reflecting the two base emotions (according to psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross).
Kicking off the album with Love, Marina embraces optimism and peace with joyous dance-pop cuts and feel-good anthems packed with enough lyrical life mantras to fill a gallery's worth of affirmative self-help posters. Even on existential ruminations "To Be Human" and "End of the Earth," the purity of Marina's wonder helps pull some clunky "We Are the World"-esque lyrics from drowning in corny sentimentality. Most of the album's standouts reside in this first half, such as the shimmering "Handmade Heaven" and the pulsing "Superstar." Marina's irresistible Latin-kissed hit "Baby" -- a collaboration with Clean Bandit and Luis Fonsi -- slides comfortably into the mix, while the insightful "Enjoy Your Life" empowers with a motivating message that finds Marina sharing her positive headspace with listeners who might need this aural pep talk.
Hopping over to Fear, she delves deeper into the troubled thoughts and anxieties that bubbled beneath Love's sparkling surface. "Believe in Love" sounds like a Reputation-era Taylor Swift song, a bittersweet heartbreaker that pairs twinkling piano and a mid-tempo beat with the sentiment that "losing you is what I'm afraid of." "Life Is Strange" prolongs the inner turmoil as Marina admits "[I] don't know what I'm doing with my life" before concluding "all we know is life is strange" with quirky production that echoes her Family Jewels sound. These songs are a bit lyrically heavy for pop, but they remain catchy enough to dance and groove through the gloom, especially on the Broods-featuring "Emotional Machine," a throbbing club track that eschews the rest of this half's by-the-numbers approach (which falls somewhere between Swift and Ellie Goulding).
By the time Marina reaches her big cathartic moment on album closer "Soft to be Strong," she's realized "when love is lost, it's only fear in disguise" and resolves that "love has to be soft to be strong”.
As the first offering of a new stage in her career, Love + Fear not only reveals its creator as newly hopeful, but it also gives hope that future efforts might be carved in a similar fashion. Marina's Electra heart still beats, it's just pumping smoother and with a confidence born from a renewed and mature perspective”.
I would urge anyone who has not yet approached the album to give it a spin. Even if you are not a huge Pop fan or think it is not up your street, spend a little bit of time with one of last year’s most underrated albums. I do love a good concept album and I think Love + Fear is rich and well developed. MARINA, in her new guise and formation, sounds phenomenal throughout and, as a co-writer on all tracks, you get this conviction and connection to the material. Over a year after its release, I think Love + Fear should get some more focus as it is a really solid album and it will be interesting to see where MARINA heads on her next album. From Baby, to End of the Earth, through to Life Is Strange, and No More Suckers, Love + Fear is an album full of…
TERRIFIC songwriting.